The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class

(Paperback)

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Description

An enduring history of how race and class came together to mark the course of the antebellum US and our present crisis. Roediger shows that in a nation pledged to independence, but less and less able to avoid the harsh realities of wage labor, the identity of white came to allow many Northern workers to see themselves as having something in common with their bosses. Projecting onto enslaved people and free Blacks the preindustrial closeness to pleasure that regimented labor denied them, white workers consumed blackface popular culture, reshaped languages of class, and embraced racist practices on and off the job. Far from simply preserving economic advantage, white working-class racism derived its terrible force from a complex series of psychological and ideological mechanisms that reinforced stereotypes and helped to forge the very identities of white workers in opposition to Blacks. Full of insight regarding the precarious positions of not-quite-white Irish immigrants to the US and the fate of working class abolitionism, Wages of Whiteness contributes mightily and soberly to debates over the 1619 Project and critical race theory.

Reviews

The Celestine Prophecy of whiteness studies. * SPIN *
An extremely important and insightful book. * The Nation *
A brilliant account of how white workers in antebellum America constructed a social identity fundamentally premised on their 'whiteness.' -- Steve Fraser * American Historical Review *
Compelling. -- John White * Times Higher Education Supplement *
Delivers powerful insights into the collective psyche of the U.S. working class. Striking. -- Chris Searle * Morning Star *
An important contribution to our understanding of what has often been called 'American exceptionalism.' Sensitive and detailed handling of a wide range of original sources. -- Louis Kushnick * Race and Class *
Brilliant. Remarkable for its subtlety, its penetrating and honest analysis. -- Fred Whitehead * People's Culture *
Scholarly and thoroughly documented, The Wages of Whiteness is nonetheless a highly readable, compact and compelling narrative. A provocative illumination of the long and tortuous history of racism in the U.S. -- Franklin Rosemont * Heartland Journal *
Casts a new light on a broad social, cultural and political landscape. -- Iver Bernstein * Journal of American History *
Far and away the best treatment of white working-class racial attitudes in the nineteenth century that I have seen. -- George M. Fredrickson
An indispensable addition to our knowledge of American working class formation. -- Joe W. Trotter * Journal of Social History *
In this penetrating study of the origins of white working-class racial attitudes, Roediger profoundly illuminates the new labor history. A distinctive extension of the scholarly studies that locate the nexus of American society in race and labor. -- Joseph Boskin * Choice *
A timely and important intervention in the current debates over 'race' and ethnicity. Roediger has opened up the question of white identity. -- Catherine Hall * New Left Review *
Interesting and useful. Reconstructs how labor in America made racism part of its very being. -- John DeBrizzi * Telos *
A brilliant, authoritative, carefully researched study of major importance. -- Michael Rogin * Radical History Review *
A real contribution to the study of the dynamic relationship that exists between the variables of race and class. A very engaging and compelling book. Wages of Whiteness will have a broad appeal to students and researchers across a wide array of disciplines. -- Lisa Reilly and Cameron McCarthy * European Journal of Intercultural Studies *
A welcome challenge to the old and new mythmakers. -- Noel Ignatiev * Labor [Le Travail] *
A significant contribution, particularly necessary for those who want to see the struggle for labor unity across racial lines move forward. -- Paul Mishler * Science and Society *
Roediger's lasting contribution ensures that the history of race and class can no longer be written from the perspective of romantic working class heroes, nor can it be written in a spirit of self-righteous 'anger.' -- Barry Goldberg * New Politics *
Subtle, serious, commands our attention -- J. Milton Yinger * Ethnic and Racial Studies *
Roediger's excellent book is must reading for those interested in American working-class formation. -- Andrew Kim * Critical Sociology *
In The Wages of Whiteness David Roediger takes a courageous look at the development of white working-class racism and attempts to unravel its complex skein of economic, cultural, and psycho-political issues. -- Soledad Santiago * Foundation News *
Of great originality and yet firmly grounded in a rich and diverse scholarship. There is no denying the enormous achievement of this book. Henceforth there will be no evading the question of racism in our contemplation of working-class formation in America. -- David Brody * Journal of Interdisciplinary History *
Offers a compelling understanding of working-class racism. A rich and detailed history that traces notions of whiteness from the early seventeenth century to the late nineteenth. -- Rhonda Levine * Contemporary Sociology *
Much has been written about the sources of racism and the wellsprings of racial conflict but few historians have shown David Roediger's sensitivity to the process by which race figured in defining the very nature of American society. The author's most important contribution is to elucidate how racial identity was critical to the formation of the working class during the nineteenth century. Roediger's central argument is most compelling. -- Ronald Mendel * Labour History Review *
David Roediger's fascinating and vital study will satisfy even the most jaded intellectual palate and deserves the widest circulation. -- Martin Crawford * History *
The book speaks so clearly to what historians know about the American working class, but with enormous originality. Broadly accessible to a wide audience, it connects the histories of slave labor and free labor thus providing a more profound understanding of American working class formation. Theoretically sophisticated, pulling together subtle but significant connections among race, class and gender. Blindingly revealing and of lasting scholarly value. * Organization of American Historians Prize Committee on awarding Wages the 1992 Merle Curti Prize *
At last an American labor historian realizes that white workers have a racial identity that matters as race matters to those who are not white. -- Neil Irvin Painter
Praise for Black on White: Black Writers on what It Means to be White edited by David R. Roediger:

Although long dismissed as irrelevant or biased, African American views on whiteness are in fact crucial to any intelligent discussion on race. By documenting the history of these views, David Roediger is not only addressing a compelling need, he is enriching the eld of Race Studies. -- Toni Morrison
Praise for Black on White: Black Writers on what It Means to be White edited by David R. Roediger:

Black on White is a brilliantly disturbing collection of work by black authors who are the often unappreciated foreparents of contemporary debates about the fallacies and functions of whiteness. These writings throw generous light on Fannie Lou Hamer's deliciously cryptic claim: the mistake that whites made with blacks is that they put us behind them leaving blacks little choice, for survival's sake, but to learn and master white culture. Black on White is proof that not only was Hamer right, but that if white Americans are to survive the madness of whiteness, they must now listen to and learn from those who made a glorious art out of a painful necessity. -- Michael Eric Dyson author of Race Rules
Praise for Black on White: Black Writers on what It Means to be White edited by David R. Roediger:

Brilliant, wide-ranging and beautifully executed, Black on White puts to rest any claims that 'whiteness' is a passing fad meant to put white folks at the center again. -- Robin D.G. Kelley
Praise for Black on White: Black Writers on what It Means to be White edited by David R. Roediger:

Yet another ash of brilliance illuminates and largely defines a vital subject area. Black on White deserves the widest reading. -- Sterling Stuckey, Presidential Chair, University of California Riverside and author of Slave Culture
Praise for Black on White: Black Writers on what It Means to be White edited by David R. Roediger:

This valuable collection provides a new and badly-needed perspective on America's deep seated problems of racial inequality and antagonism. Much has been written and anthologized to show what whites thought and felt about blacks. This is the rst effort to present a range of black opinion on the meaning of whiteness, and it is a notably successful one. -- George M. Fredrickson, Edgar E. Robinson Professor of United States History, Stanford University
Praise for Black on White: Black Writers on what It Means to be White edited by David R. Roediger:

Black on White is a superb collection of writings by African Americans about the nature of White identity in the United States. David Roediger's informed and inspired introduction and the eloquent and insightful works he has collected expose the ideas, attitudes, and actions that transform the ction of white racial identity into an all too real social fact. At a time when white politicians, pundits, and private citizens base many public policies and even more private decisions in the knowledge they claim to have about black people, whiteness seems to disappear. Black on White redirects our focus to the way white people appear to blacks, to the insights, analyses, and interpretations emanating from people who became experts on whiteness out of dire necessity. -- George Lipsitz, University of California, San Diego
Praise for The Sinking Middle Class:

An incisive, timely, clear-eyed analysis of race and class in America. -- Robin D.G. Kelley
Praise for The Sinking Middle Class:

Brilliant and Insightful [it] explores the ways in which appeals to save the middle class in electoral politics harm the very constituencies they purport to help. -- George Lipsitz
Praise for Class, Race, and Marxism:

No contemporary intellectual has better illuminated the interwoven social histories and conceptual dimensions of race and class domination. With this stunning new collection of essays, David Roediger once again demonstrates that he is a vital thinker for all of us seeking to bridge the imperatives of economic and social justice. -- Nikhil Singh, New York University
Praise for Class, Race, and Marxism:
David Roediger's work is always as learned as it is profoundly engaged with the pursuit of social justice. From his signature study of

Author Bio

David Roediger is widely credited as a founder of Critical Whiteness Studies. He writes as a historian and interdisciplinary scholar of race and labor in the US. Educated in public schools and in social movements, his major books include Wages of Whiteness, Seizing Freedom, and How Race Survived US History.